Friday, September 30, 2005

I saw this posted at Bubblegumfink! – a cool site – and it was mentioned in the comments as being noted elsewhere, but that's not going to stop me from doing my own take on it since it covers two of my passions: art and zombies!

Yeah doggy!

This also kinda ties back to an instructor I had during the decline of my adult education at PPCC (Pikes Peak Community College). He USED TO work for Hallmark and he USED TO work for Disney, so OF COURSE he knew best. He and I got into a bit of a head-to-head fight over the idea behind copying.

One of our assignments was to take a photocopied picture that he passed out and blow it up to at least twice the size and then add details or something like that. It's been over ten years, and I really just remember the outcome.

When it came time to do the group critique he tore into me for actually redrawing the picture, rather than use the wall projector or a photocopier to get it done.

I argued that illustrators needed to know how to draw and he said that was bullshit. The majority of illustrators that he knew couldn't draw to save their lives. They knew how to use their tools to do the work for them, far faster than anyone could draw and if I wanted to be a professional I would do the same.

Needless to say, I resisted his stupidity, no matter how right he might have been.

What does this have to do with zombies, you ask?

Simple. One day I had all I could take and I leapt upon him and stabbed him to death with my sketching pencil. While waiting for the cops to arrive, to my utter horror his perforated corpse unexpectedly rose to its feet and started munching on the other students while moaning, "Coppppyyyyyyyyy!"

I kid. In reality I finished out the class, took whatever grade I had – B or some-such – and avoided taking another one of his classes for as long as possible.

The zombies really come in with the following DVD cover. The illustrator obviously belonged to the same school of thought as my former instructor.

Here's the cover:

click for full cover

If you look closely at one of the central zombies, you might recognize someone:

That's right. It's none other than George W. Bush during his wacky drunken college days!

Oh, wait, no it's not. It's Simon from the old, and awesome, Tales of the Zombie magazine. Just flipped and chilled. See:

click for full cover

You may be thinking, Why that no-good thieving illustrator! How dare he take a well known zombie icon and use him to make that DVD cover! Sure, he made his hair a bit more wispy, but he left the medallion!

Wait, there's more. Notice this villager that Simon has just flung aside like a flailing, screaming native tissue:

He also made the DVD cover, only as a full-fledged zombie, flipped and chilled like Simon:

So not only is the illustrator stealing zombies from other work, he's bringing in scab zombies!

I would be willing to bet that if you had access to a large enough image database you would find that there isn't a single original image on the entire DVD front cover. Because, really, if he was willing to snag a villager rather than draw his own zombie, why would he bother to draw any of the rest of them?

Wednesday, September 28, 2005

A little while ago I was leaving a comment at a Blogger blog that required word verification in order to weed out spambots. The idea, of course, is that the squiggly letters interfere with optical character recognition, which effectively makes the bots go "durrr...". They are also supposed to be random letters, but occasionally they almost seem to make a word.

This time the word was "coozflif".

It probably says something about the state of my filthy, filthy mind but that random assembly of letters seems borderline pornographic. Like it could be a standard word used in the porn industry.

For example, it would be the perfect job title for a female porn star's fluffer* if they actually needed such a thing.

"Hey Bob! I heard you got hired on as Vikki Vixen's coozflif! Is that a sweet job or WHAT?!"

"Well, to be honest it doesn't pay much but it's all you can eat and as easy as chewing gum."

If I ever see another random word that is better than "coozflif", like, say, "assmonkey", I will be sure to take a screenshot for you. I don't know why I didn't today, other than to say my brain is sleepy.

2.

On the drive home from work yesterday I passed a homemade garage sale sign that was marginally attached to a stop sign. I say marginally because it had slipped all the way down and was partially obscured by weeds and grass.

As I sat at that corner, waiting for a bus and the cars that were backed up behind it to pass, I was just staring at the sign. It was a typical handmade marker-on-cardboard sign. That wasn't anything special.

What WAS special though was the feeling that passed over me. I had never really felt such a feeling before. Suddenly I had a huge desire to put my car in park, hop out, run over to the sign and add the letter "B" to it, making it a "Garbage Sale".

There was enough space between the letters.

I had a Sharpie in the car.

Nobody was waiting behind me.

Yet I refrained. I thought of how the seller would feel when she returned to collect her sign.

"I sure thought turnout would have been better. Oh well, perhaps next week. Hey. WTF?! 'Garbage Sale'?! No freakin' wonder!" and then the crying and raging would begin about how, if only that comedian with the Sharpie hadn't passed by, she might have finally sold dusty, old Grandma.

Sure, it would have been funny, but mean and petty. And normally I'm not mean, so I really have no idea why the urge came to me.

Actually, in thinking about it, it would have probably gone unnoticed since it was a Tuesday. How many people have garage sales on Tuesdays? Likely the sign was leftover from Friday, which would explain it's ground-bound location.

Still, the urge to vandalize concerns me. Have any of you felt an almost unstoppable urge to deface something? If so, tell us about it.

Tuesday, September 27, 2005

Hey, I've nothing to talk about, nothing written and nothing drawn. I'm a big gaping hole of absent creativity right now. Look! See? I gape. So, lacking anything worthwhile I figure I'll post the last round of comments I received and my replies to them. Sweet, huh? I just want you to be assured that your membership dues aren't being wasted, and that in spite of my silence I still care.

And what is so wrong about people walking around shirtless, scratching their hairy bellies and drinking malt liquor? After 15+ years, my husband hasn't complained yet ...happyfunball | Homepage | 09.21.05 - 4:45 pm-To be honest, it just wasn't where I pictured myself as a child. I was so full of hopes, dreams and pop-rocks back then. Now they are all gone and the pop-rocks gave me a hairy belly. Alas.

---

A "Check Into Cash" opened up near my apartment. 4 weeks later, Cleveland burned to the ground.

Run.CtrlAltDelete | Homepage | 09.21.05 - 4:53 pm-On my way into work a Check place's company vehicle passed me. It was a Hummer. A cleansing fire might not be a bad thing.

---

Your belly's not hairy.

A Waffle House, huh? I'm telling people I live on the good side of Barnes! Heheh.Heather | Homepage | 09.21.05 - 5:37 pm-I do believe you stand corrected.

I don't know if that's the good side or not. Have you looked closely at that store on the corner? It's a local shop for local people! We'll have no trouble here!

---

I don't think you can officially say that your neighborhood has gone down the tubes until they've built a drive-through Starbucks. Maybe that's actually gone up the tubes. It's so hard to tell with Starbucks.The Retropolitan | Homepage | 09.21.05 - 6:20 pm-Starbucks fears my neighborhood. There isn't one within stone throwing distance and that's outright unnatural. There IS a drive-through coffee place though, up on the corner, but they aren't Starbucks. I like your site by the way. If I ever get around to cleaning up my links I'll be adding you.

---

I like Waffle House.... I miss them... There aren't any in Michigan, at least that I've been able to find.

And, I've never associated them with failing communities, just highway exits. The check cashing places are much worse... And I'm surrounded by them.

We also had a place where you could sell your blood plasma, but it closed.mark | Homepage | 09.23.05 - 9:11 am-That's nostalgia talking, Mark. If you ever find yourself near one, drop in and see if it's as good as you remember. There's one down the hill from my work that's nice and broken in.

I never said we were failing. Merely mutating into something horrible and dangerous, like a rat that has fallen into a barrel of toxic waste. Now I'll need to blend or be destroyed by the creatures that surround me.

At least the plasma place didn't reopen as a sperm bank, although that might reduce the amount of porn and condoms you find on your street.

---

I looove Waffle Houses! You can mingle with the common people there. Chicken Little | Homepage | 09.26.05 - 5:29 am-I'm afraid I AM the common people and we aren't all that we're cracked up to be. Thanks for dropping by my site though. I'll return the favor.

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First the liquor store, now the Waffle House. Pretty soon, you'll be sporting a Dale Jr. trucker hat and postulatin' on the South's coming revolution.

Have fun with that.AndyC | Homepage | 09.26.05 - 11:26 am-Nooooooooooo! Four years in the military and a vanishing hairline haven't been able to get me to wear a hat with any degree of comfort. The only time I mention South is when giving direction. And kids, always remember to stretch thoroughly before postulating or you may rip something. Rip it most horribly.

---

Mark is correct - no Waffle Houses in Michigan. And from what the guys in Kentucky told me (when I was there for work), that's a good thing. He called it Awful Waffle.Kathleen | Homepage | 09.27.05 - 12:53 pm-That sounds about right. I guess the problem is they pulled out of Michigan before they could ruin Mark's image of them. Thanks Waffle House. What happened to your motto of leaving no stomach unturned? You slackers.

---

And that's it. Have a good week everyone. I'll post again if I think of something better than this.

-*Okay, not the first. More like the 40th. Sue me. As for the Skittles, I ate 'em. The hairy belly needed belly food.

Wednesday, September 21, 2005

I knew the neighborhood wasn't the best when I moved in, but I couldn't afford better and at the time housing was scarce.

There's a strip club across from us on Austin Bluffs Parkway and a High School across from us on Barnes*, but it's getting worse.

In the past few months there have been a couple of Dollar Stores spring up in the area.

Then the first "Cash Your Paycheck Here" place arrived.

Now, as I was on my way in to work this morning I saw that they're breaking ground for a brand new Waffle House about four blocks away from my apartment.

A Waffle House.

People who dine at Denny's don't even have respect for Waffle House.

My son, when he heard my expression of disgust as we drove by, asked what was so bad about Waffle House. 12 years old, a veteran of 'Halo 2', GTAs '3' through 'San Andreas' and XBox Live and yet he still manages to retain some innocence. I told him that we might be slightly better off it was an IHOP. He just shrugged and resumed listening to the Beastie Boys.

I guess there's nothing for it. I'm going to have to start a meth lab, sell crack and walk around barefoot and shirtless, scratching at my hairy belly and drinking malt liquor. There are certain standards that must be upheld and I would hate to let my neighborhood down.

---* I've only been in the strip club once for my son's trombone recital. Oh wait. That was the High School. It's hard to tell the way kids dress these days. That's right. Now that I think about it, there were no poles and the music was less thumpy.

Tuesday, September 20, 2005

Well, I've indulged in a bit of (almost) old fashioned pencil drawing. Remember that request awhile back for cover ideas for a zombie book that I mentioned? The person requesting it wanted a black & white charcoal or pencil drawing to use for a chapbook he was putting together.

I figured it's been well over two years since I last tried any pencil drawing that was intended to go beyond a sketch so I was a bit concerned that my skills were rusty. And they were. It probably didn't help that rather than actually break out a pad of paper and charcoal pencils I made it on the computer using a natural media drawing program called Sketchbook Pro. Mainly I did this because my scanner really isn't that good and if I drew the picture on paper and then scanned it some detail would be lost.

What was really difficult though, is when I draw on paper I'm in the habit of flipping it all around while drawing so that I can approach the line the way I want. You can't do that in a drawing program. Not as naturally as you can with a drawing pad. It would be too processor intensive to keep track of every single stroke. So I had to contort my hand into uncomfortable positions quite a lot. Plus there was a whole lot of head tilting to compensate. It's hard to explain. You would just have to watch me draw.

Anyhow, after about 3-4 hours work and a massive hand cramp later, here it is:

And here's a 100% detail picture:

I've sent the low-res off to the person who made the request. If he likes it, great! If he doesn't or has already chosen something – he was in a bit of a hurry and I dragged my feet a bit on it – then that's okay too. I really needed the practice.

I fucking love it. Send me the hi res version. I will use it somewhere. I have the backcover done and I may have the front cover done BUT i will definitely put this in front of my story and maybe on the cover itself if the artisit doesn't get back to me. I'm sending everything to the printer on oct. 1. i will keep you informed - john

Jordyn is totally hooked on that show. The rest of us enjoy it as well, but not to the outward degree that she does. I might have to purchase the DVD at some point, but for now the downloaded shows will do.

On Sunday Heather and I drove up to Denver to watch the Broncos squeak out a victory over the San Diego Chargers. Anyone who knows me well knows that I'm failure to my gender, in that I'm not a huge fan of any organized sports. Of them all I probably enjoy watching hockey the most, followed by football, with soccer, basketball, tennis, golf and baseball tied for next to last place. Last place would go to any sports that I haven't mentioned. If I were flipping channels I would probably stop on hockey, might stop on football if there wasn't something else I wanted to watch and anything else would just flow on by. I don't know why this is unless it's because my dad held a very low opinion of sports when I was young. I will say this though, any time I've gone to a college level or above football game – Air Force Falcons twice, Broncos twice – I've really enjoyed it. Yesterday was no exception. I was a bit bummed at the half when the Broncos trailed 3-14. But the second half was awesome and stressful. Do I know enough about football to be able to discuss it intelligently with a true fan? Hell no! I still babble and mumble, but I did enjoy it.

Enough about that. On the way to the game we drove past a Christmas tree farm on Highway 83: this is where the "strange thoughts" come in. The farm was to our right and it had row upon row of little future Christmas trees lined up, waiting to grow tall enough to be chopped down and carted off to parking lots around the world. Or Colorado. I don't know the details of how these things work. There was a barbed wire fence around the farm and on the other side of the road groups of trees were gathered together. Those of you unfamiliar with raw Colorado countryside may have trouble picturing how this looks. Think of rolling fields of yellow wild grass with occasional patches of green trees. The general lack of features and color of the surrounding countryside gave the farm – in my mind – the look of an arbor concentration camp and the groups of trees gathered outside the farm seemed like mourning relatives.

I told Heather that it was a good thing trees aren't sentient or that farm would be totally barbaric. All those young trees being raised for the sole purpose of being chopped down and dragged off to have their corpses propped up in someone's living room, decorated with shiny stuff and left to rot for a few weeks in celebration of the birth of Santa Claus. Oh. Wait. Jesus Christ. It's hard to tell these days. Then, when the day of celebration has passed, usually around New Year's Day – although some aim for June – the ornaments are removed from the brittle husk of the tree child, with the exception of the tinsel that is permanently twined between the needles like glittery mummy wrappings, and the tree is dragged out to the curb where it will be picked up and carted off to a landfill to finish its trip into decay.

It's only mid-September and you can already tell that I've got the Christmas Spirit. I think I feel a carol coming on. Tooo-la-roooo-la-rooah! My mistake. It was a ditty.

If trees could think, they would be pissed. Heather agreed with me, said I was goofy and we drove on. Nearby we passed a house that was on land that mostly consisted of tall yellow grass except for a group of trees that was practically engulfing the house as though it intended on destroying it and I said something along the lines of, "Look at that! It's payback time! 'Were coming to get you, you murderous bastards! Just sit tight. We'll be right there. Any minute now...'" and there was much laughter.

Yes, I know, the things we do to chickens, pigs and cows are far worse, yet I'll still eat chicken fingers, sliced ham and hamburgers. Heck, at lunch on plan on eating "naked chicken fingers" from Popeye's. Talk about a revolting name, if you think about it. So I'm a hypocrite. Like I'm the first. But I will say this, at least we eat the animals. I've never seen anyone eat a Christmas tree when they were finished playing with it.

We also passed groupings of cows, llamas and horses. At one point, quite a ways off, I could swear I saw a two headed sheep bouncing around. It was black at both ends, white in the middle and I could barely make it out. I asked Heather, "Do you see that?" but we had gone down in a depression and the field was no longer in view. She said, "What?"

"It looked like a two-headed sheep." Right after saying that we rose from the depression and were finally at a good viewing angle on the "sheep". Then I said, "Or a pony." For that's what it turned out to be. Heather was laughing and laughing at me. In my defense I said, "He was standing in a gully. And see how his head and his tail are black? He must have been flicking his tail and raising and lowering his head at the same time and from a distance it looked like a two-headed sheep fighting with itself about which way to go. Stop laughing at me."

As my daughter would say, I am NOT goofy.

Have a good week everyone!

As Jack Handy said on Deep Thoughts: "If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason."

Friday, September 16, 2005

Let me start off by saying that I'm fully aware of Maddox and his "I am better than you kids." page. As a matter of fact, it was stumbling across that page that led me to his website. Not that my finding his site is any big whoop. The guy gets 100,000+ visitors a day. I just brought it up to say that I'm aware of it so no need to re-inform me of its existence after the following.

Now, on with the show.

Here's a link to a picture my 5-year-old daughter drew at her mother's house last weekend.

Click it to view full sized picture which also happens to be more than just this one leetle thing.

Do I think it's high art? Of course not. But I do like it, for a couple of reasons:

It shows that she's trying out various ways of drawing things and it also shows a progression in her attention to details.

But most of all there was the smile on her face when she gave it to me. Since you didn't see it and I don't have a photo to show you, I'll just say that it was big, shiny and full of pride. It made me feel good all morning.

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Why, I'm glad you asked, even if you did come off a bit rude. Awhile back I stumbled across the website "All Things Zombie", probably via Copygodd's website. At the time they were talking about a book that had just been released called "Cold Flesh". It's a collection of 25 short stories that each had something to do with zombies, was 461 pages long and only cost $9.99. I was itching for some zombie fiction so I ordered it. When it arrived I tore into it. All in all it's a very good collection of stories.

"That's spiffy that you've been reading a book, Collin, even though it has do with zombies (eyeroll), but so what?"

Well, I also joined up on the forum at ATZ and I got involved in a discussion about the book. One of the authors, D.L. Snell picked up on my offer to review the book and encouraged me to actually get started. Since I was nearly finished with it when I made the suggestion it meant that I would need to go back through each story, reread them and then write down how I felt about each one without giving away too much and ruining them. I've never really tried doing that before. It turns out that it's not as easy as it sounds, however I do have my first review up and D.L. Snell asked if he could re-post them at the "Cold Flesh" website. So far so good.

"You do realize that you are babbling right?"

Yes. Yes I do. I'm tired. Essentially, this means that there's an outside possibility that I may have to post here a bit less until I have the review completed. Or perhaps not. I just don't know. Also there was a request on the forum for B&W charcoal zombie art that I might make an attempt at as well. It's been ten years since I last worked in charcoal, but "back in the day" it was my medium of choice. The only problem is it's needed pretty soon. Ugh.

I would like to apologize to my readers who have possibly been following my site for awhile now – all ten or so of you – and are annoyed with this sudden focus on zombies. All I can say is that it's probably a passing phase and if you hang tight things should return to normal. Eventually.

Monday, September 12, 2005

There is a game due out on the 18th called "Indigo Prophecy". I've played the demo and seen the full trailer for it and it looks like it could really be something great. While checking reviews of "Burnout: Revenge" – which is ranked around 90% so far out of 4 reviews – I found that there was a review of "Idigo Prophecy" done by Eurogamer where the game is apparently titled "Fahrenheit" and already out.

Here's a brief excerpt:

"... the game sucks ..."

Oh, wait. I'm sorry. Here's the rest of the line:

"For a start, the game sucks you into a paranormal murder mystery right from the beginning."

Heheh.

Anyhow, if anyone's interested I'll let you know what I think of it after I've had it in my greedy gaming hands for a week or so.

In the meantime you can read the full review here. A bit of warning though, if you use Firefox it may lock up your browser. I was only finally able to view it by switching to Safari.

Saturday, September 10, 2005

I see that over the year and a bit that my site has been around three people have found their way here searching for how to draw a motorcycle, and for that I'm very sorry.

Three other people – presumably not the same three as you would think they would have learned – arrived here searching for "bangin hos". I doubt they left any more satisfied, but I find it a lot more humorous.

Thursday, September 08, 2005

Cracking open these shells makes me think of tomb robbing. You have this hard case which contains stuff you want. You feel around until you find the seam where it should open, apply pressure and *CRACK* open it pops. Then you remove the wee peanut bodies and peel off their nasty, flakey grave wrappings and toss them in your mouth. crunch-crunch-crunch. Then it's off to the next peanut casket. Gruesome? Perhaps. But my they are tasty. And you can also draw leeeeetel faces with expressions of horror on them using a ball point pen. If you are so inclined.

And quite a few of them at that. I'm surprised. So, without eyes it is. It seems that Copygodd and I were the only ones that preferred "with". Thank you to all who participated in my "market research". I've now added a new section to my Zombie Gear where you can find this:

as well as many other products, all reasonably priced for CafePress. I even made a thong available! Personally, I'm partial to the teddy bear.

A big thanks to my friend Justin C. for the link to Banksy. This guy really appeals to my inner anarchist. I LOVE his main page graphic. The whole site makes me wanna go paint something, and I hate to paint.

Tuesday, September 06, 2005

Oh yeah. Labor Day. That's right. So, I'm off to a slow start this week. It can only get better, right? Since I have nothing for you of my own I'll pass along two links that I followed from boingboing. I know, I'm so kick-ass original.

The first is not for the squeamish. And that includes me. I didn't get past the first page* . It's a place where people can go and share photos of their horrible, horrible scars and tell the bunny hugging, sunshine filled stories behind them. Oh, and you can rate the scars as well. Does it get any better?

Those of you who know me would probably figure this is right up my alley. You would likely be correct if I were to give it a chance, but I'm afraid to. Not because I'm afraid of the game. I'm afraid of another non-productive activity sucking the last of my free time away like a delicious chocolate shake disappearing up a silly straw. Just reading the forum chatter about it on All Things Zombie got me wanting to play.

Must... hold... out... Burnout Revenge is only (knock-on-wood) a week away. Yes, that's also non-productive, but it's going to be oh so enjoyable!

Anyhow, if you feel like seeing if you have what it takes to withstand hordes of undead without actually having to, give it a shot and let me know what you think. The last page on the forum link makes it sound pretty bleak for the survivors. As it should be.

---*Just in case you all might see something different, I refreshed the page. Yep, sure enough, some wimpy scar showed up. Just so you don't think I'm a total wuss I feel I must say that the first one I saw was someone's fingers that had been through a bandsaw. Ugh.

* unmistakenly isn't even a word. Unmistakably, yes. But not unmistakenly. Oh well. Anyone can make a mistake.

Here's How You Can Know!

Dear Friend, (I assure you, I'm not your friend, friend.)Please take a few moments out of your busy schedule to read this tract. (Holy dude, I'm taking out a few moments to not only read it, but re-write it and ridicule it. Can I hear a "thank you"?) It could make the difference between spending eternity in Heaven or eternity in Hell. THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY TO HEAVEN! (That would make a good slogan for ValuHo.) If you will believe God's Word, you can see what is required for you to go to Heaven.

FIRST, NOTICE EVERYBODY IS IN THE SAME PREDICAMENT(or Sin Pickle, if you will)

WE ARE ALL SINNERS(If you feel you are without sin, cast a stone. Now that you've cast a stone I feel that I should point out that casting stones is a sin. Now that we are finally all on the same page...)

Romans 3:10 - "As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:"Romans 3:23 - "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God;"

(I feel that picking out one passage to prove your point and isolating it from its page neighbors is silly as context can mean a whole world of difference.)

SECOND, EVERY SINNER PAYS THE SAME PRICE FOR SIN(So if you steal a Twinkie from 7-11, you might as well kill a few people on your way home. Heck, squeeze in a bit of ass coveting too. The price is the same.)

Romans 6:23a - "For the wages of sin is death..." (Which is why I sin strictly pro bono.)Romans 5:12 - "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned."

When Adam ate of the forbidden fruit, "...sin entered into the world." Death came as a result of sin; therefore we must die. (Every mother f-ing last one of us! Sorry. Pulp Fiction moment.)

Revelation 20:14-15 - "And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire."

THIRD, THE PUNISHMENT FOR SIN HAS BEEN FAID IN FULL(But I seem to have lost the receipt. I know I have it on me somewhere. Just a sec. Huh. Must be in my other pants.)

God has proved His love for all sinners in that He gave His only begotten Son, Jesus, to die for us. (And all we got Him was a card.)

Romans 5:8 - "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

God has a gift for all sinners, and it is ABSOLUTELY FREE! (And if you act in the next ten minutes, He'll toss in this handy inside-the-shell egg scrambler, also ABSOLUTELY FREE! IT'S AMAZING! How can He afford to do it?! WE DON'T KNOW! But He can!)

Romans 6:23b - "...but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."

(Talk about a hard gift to wrap. And don't even THINK about exchanging it.)

SO HOW CAN YOU KNOW 100% SURE YOU WILL GO TO HEAVEN?(Um. You can't?)

First, admit you are a sinner. (Oh yeah. That should be obvious to anyone reading this by now.)Second, realize that without Christ, you are doomed to Hell. (He's like the last life preserver on the Titanic that is Earth.)Third, realize that God gave His son to die in your place. (When it's put that way it sounds like some kind of insurance scam. "Okay, let's see; I tie Jesus to the chair, set fire to the building, fly off to Bermuda, meet up with my secretary who's cashed out my policies and live happily forever and ever. Man am I ever glad I found this Jesus guy!")

BY SIMPLE FAITH, BELIEVE AND RECEIVE GOD'S SON AS PAYMENT FOR YOUR SIN.("All my years of sinning and waiting have finally paid off. I just got my Jesus in the mail. I'll show Him to you as soon as He's done cleaning the pool. It's amazing to watch. He walks on water you know.")

Romans 10:9, 13 - "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved (13) For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."

Dear friend, (Oh. I see. Now I'm a lower case "friend". Fine. Be like that.)If you see yourself as a lost sinner and without Christ, simply pray, "Lord, I know I'm a sinner and bound to go to Hell, but today I receive You into my heart to be my Saviour. I am putting my trust in You to take me to Heaven when I die, in Jesus' name, Amen!" (Be sure to include a self-addressed stamped envelope and please allow 6-10 weeks for Deliverance.)

John 1:12 - "But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name."

(Odd, the use of lowercase in the "he" and "him" in that one... perhaps it's a mistake. Mmmm. Nope. Apparently, if I'm following this correctly, the "he" in question is John. See? Context is important.)

Have a good weekend everybody. If I can summon up the nerve I may drop by Focus on the Family at some point this weekend and see what pamphlets I can pick up. Wish me luck.

Thursday, September 01, 2005

People talking on their cell phones while driving shouldn't make a u-turn without looking to see if I am about to smash into their dumb asses. On the plus side, there's a good chance she screamed wonderfully to the person she was speaking with. I stopped within two feet of her driver's side door. Idiot.